


The Tragedian's Guide to Loving Brutus

by ahala



Category: Ancient History RPF, Julius Caesar - Shakespeare
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, M/M, Prose Poem, Suicide mention, blink and you miss the ship-y stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-17
Updated: 2019-11-17
Packaged: 2021-02-07 17:13:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21461617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ahala/pseuds/ahala
Relationships: Marcus Junius Brutus the Younger/Gaius Cassius Longinus, Marcus Junius Brutus the Younger/Porcia Catonis
Comments: 3
Kudos: 12





	The Tragedian's Guide to Loving Brutus

**Step 1. Practise your divination.**

This is the only way you will understand him. The stars speak clearly, but it takes a certain knowledge to hear them, and such is the prerequisite for decoding his words and his intentions. He can be predictable, formulaic, in his wit and his actions. A personal attack, an open challenge, and a public forum and he will thrive. A personal attack, a veiled threat, a fantasy of control and he will break down.

Just as Venus rises and falls and comets whistle across the night sky within a second’s accuracy, a careful eye can translate the cosmos, the sound of meteors whispering in his voice, and the hum of the heavens masking the faults in his stars.

**Step 2. Count your money.**

Debt is priceless, and any currency will suffice. He will pay attention when things are owed (see Step 3), especially when he is the one in debt. You brought him into this world, granted him the gift of life. You opened your arms to him when he took arms against you. You spilled your blood by your own hand. All of these will suffice. 

**Step 3. Hold your ear to the confessional booth.**

Of all his sins, and there are many, wrath is his most refined. It is the deepest layer of Hell, frozen cold, so nothing may grow and nothing may survive. Like the fine point of an icicle, the perfection of a snowflake, his anger is meditated and crafted with the skill of an artisan. If you cannot withstand the freeze, then recognise when the air is growing cold. 

Lust is most forgivable, but it is a diamond among his coal temperament, just as rare as it is stark against the rest of his personality.

Greed is his ugliest, and it simmers beneath his skin like magma, acrid steam ready to asphyxiate and starve out pennies. 

Pride is his most fickle. His name is as ancient as the pyramids, sentinels in the desert for those to follow, and those to have faith in. It is an emblem of foundation, of resurrection, and for so many, this is all they are, and all he is. But those tombs have long been robbed of all worth, and as tall as he may stand, he knows there is nothing to be found within his name but old corpses that have long since become unrecognisable. Take the same paths as robbers, and somewhere you will find his heart in the darkness, primed to be ignited with something, for something, to believe in anything. 

**Step 4. Know his sensitive spots.**

Just beneath his jaw. The death of his uncle. Cats pressing their foreheads into his palm. The high arch of his feet. The twin dimples on the small of his back. His grandiose reputation. The perpetual bruise on the tendon between his thumb and forefinger from writing. (Be careful when you hold his hand.). Book IV of  _ Anabasis _ . The temporary purity of his childhood. The caning scars across his palms. There are none others.

**Step 5. Know when to let go. **

There are certain battles to concede to. He is a pillar of white fire, and at times, there is no time to stand and question. You leap into the flames beside him and burn with him or you yield. If you desire to set him ablaze, know that his kindling is dry and the wind is great; he might be slow to ignite, but once he burns, he devours, and he burns until nothing but ash remains. He will outlast those around them or wither away to smoke; there is no extinguishment. 

Be careful when you choose your battles, lest you choose poorly and fall upon a sword you were never meant to fall on, and then what love will he have for you when your body has been run through and your use for him expired?


End file.
